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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24854806">i'm gonna run this nothing town</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShippingEverything/pseuds/ShippingEverything'>ShippingEverything</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>his royal highness prince calroy rocks [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dimension 20 (Web Series)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Manipulation, Prince Consort Calroy, past lazuli/caramelinda, spoilers to episode 10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 00:33:54</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,663</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24854806</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShippingEverything/pseuds/ShippingEverything</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“That’s how I know I'm making the right choice. Cal, will you be my aide-de-camp?”</i>
  <br/>
  <i>A smile spreads across Calroy's face, sharp like the water-steel dagger he keeps tucked in his boot. “Amethar,” He says, voice sweet as the sugar beneath their feet, “It would be my honor.”</i>
</p><p>or: four snapshots of calroy and amethar, after the war</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Calroy Cruller/Amethar Rocks</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>his royal highness prince calroy rocks [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1798678</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>80</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>i'm gonna run this nothing town</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>okay i know that last tag needs a lot of explaining but it would take me a whole <i>other</i> long fic to explain the entirety of prince consort calroy so here are some quick facts that'll make this whole fic easier to understand:</p><p>- calroy hates amethar but he's also in love with him. he doesn't know he's in love with him. he's actively working to destroy house rocks and take over candia<br/>- calroy is the "youngest" of his octuplet siblings and his family farmed<br/>- caramelinda and amethar don't get married<br/>- calroy and amethar do, obviously, though they are not yet married in this fic<br/>- i don't write about canon cake slice cal, i write exclusively about <a href="https://kindlespark.tumblr.com/post/621071201312342016/anyway-heres-the-evil-cake-man-no-one-look-at-me">kindlespark's beautiful humanized cal</a></p><p>title from billie eilish's <i>You Should See Me In A Crown</i> because i made this <a href="https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5gOOyVC1hlre8pPT3FUTLU?si=EWu9PV2PTFC0b9knHa6K5A">prince consort calroy playlist</a> and then listened to it exclusively while writing</p><p>this is entirely d20socs fault but i hope you enjoy anyway!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>1.</p><p>When the War is over, when all the dust has settled, Calroy still stands.</p><p>He stands beside Amethar, the new Ruler of Candia and the Sugarlands; Amethar, the War buddy that considered Calroy his closest friend; Amethar, the arrogant, spoiled, ungrateful boy that cared more about playing soldier than his place in the Kingdom; His Majesty King Amethar of House Rocks, the Unfallen.</p><p>He stands and Amethar, in mourning clothes even at his own coronation, clears his throat.</p><p>“Cal,” Amethar starts, voice a whisper and brows furrowed, “You know I- I can't do this. I was never supposed to be the one to do this. I don't know anything about politics, I didn't pay attention in my etiquette classes and I never remember any of those fancy titles, I don't even know how to <em>read</em>, you know that.”</p><p>Calroy, who once had to trade hard labor and quick favors for his lessons, makes himself nod understandingly. “So you've told me, Your Majesty.”</p><p>“Oh, come on, don't call me <em>that</em>,” Amethar says quickly, waving a hand like his title is an annoying bug that he can shoo away. Calroy feels so sick with envy and anger that he worries for a moment that he'll faint. “I'm not just outlining my flaws for my own health, alright, I wanted to ask you… I mean, you're the best guy I know, and I trust you to watch my back, and you're great at talking us out of scrapes, and my advisors told me that I should choose someone, and-”</p><p>“Keep talking and I'll die of boredom before you can ask me anything,” Calroy interrupts, tone balanced on the line between joking and rude. Amethar smiles, a clever little thing that looks much more at home on his face than his earlier wide-eyed nervousness, and his shoulders relax from where they'd begun to climb towards his ears.</p><p>“That’s how I know I'm making the right choice. Cal, will you be my aide-de-camp?”</p><p>A smile spreads across Calroy's face, sharp like the water-steel dagger he keeps tucked in his boot. “Amethar,” He says as sweet as the sugar beneath their feet, “It would be my <em>honor</em>.”</p>
<hr/><p>2.</p><p>Her name is Caramelinda Meringue and she hates Amethar. She doesn't say as much because she's whip-smart and understands that even Amethar couldn't miss an insult like that, but Calroy can tell. He reads it in the line of her brow and the tilt of her lips, in the way her hands tighten on her dress under the table and the way her cheek dimples when she bites it to keep herself from speaking.</p><p>Calroy rather likes her.</p><p>Her father is in talks with Amethar about marriage and Amethar is deeply miserable about it, as he makes clear to Calroy each evening when they drink together. Caramelinda is miserable about it too, Calroy thinks, though she's more graceful about it, and she never even mentions that her engagement to the late Archmage Lazuli of House Rocks had been one of love and not simple allyship; no, Calroy had to use his spies to find out that one, because Caramelinda is too loyal to her duty and her father to complain where she can easily be heard. This is, technically, exactly the type of thing Amethar brought him in for, even ignoring that he has his own reasons for not wanting Caramelinda and Amethar to get married; marriage means heirs and Candia doesn't need any more Rocks brats running around.</p><p>He approaches the Duke of Meringue with a soft smile and an open ear. He asks leading questions about the Duke's land, his crops, his wife. Caramelinda is his only child, the last of his line, and even subtracting the land and livestock included in her dowry, the bride price Lazuli had promised is <em>exorbitant</em>. More than enough for the Duke to live comfortably for the rest of his days, and more than the daughter of a fairly minor noble should ever merit. </p><p><em>Love</em>, He scoffs, <em>can make fools out of even the brightest of mages</em>.</p><p>“You know, he doesn’t <em>actually</em> want you to marry his daughter,” Calroy confides to Amethar that evening.</p><p>“It <em>seems</em> like he wants me to marry her,” Amethar responds petulantly. The syrupy scent of his cologne fills Calroy’s nose as Amethar leans closer to fill his goblet with butterscotch schnapps and Calroy has to resist the urge to either sneeze or take a deep breath in. “My advisors want me to marry her too. They said keeping Lazuli’s promise will show that we still respect our allegiances in Candia.”</p><p>A part of Calroy is almost impressed that Amethar remembered all that well enough to be able to parrot it to Calroy; the rest of him is too busy being annoyed at Amethar’s advisors to care. Amethar’s advisors are a bunch of rich elders who have been pressuring the Kings of Candia for the past fifty years and who have no problem publicly calling Calroy an <em>upstart</em>.</p><p>Calroy does not like Amethar’s advisors.</p><p>“Don’t you trust me?” Calroy asks, making a show out of pouting. Amethar’s eyes flicker down, just for a second, before he settles that earnest gaze back on Calroy’s eyes. There was a time, during the War, when Calroy had gotten tired of Amethar trying to be subtle about checking out his ass and staring at his mouth, when Amethar had let Calroy push him against a tree just outside of camp, when Calroy had bit Amethar’s lip hard enough to make him bleed and then blamed it on inexperience, when Amethar had cupped a hand over Calroy’s cheek and-</p><p>Well.</p><p>Calroy mentally shakes himself. None of that matters right now. The War was the War, but this is now.</p><p>“‘Course I do, more than anyone in the world,” Amethar answers, soft and genuine enough to make Calroy’s skin crawl.</p><p>“Then trust me on this. He wants land and gold, and his quickest route to those things right now is making you keep up Lazuli’s part of the bargain. If we can offer him an easier way to get what he wants-”</p><p>“Then I don’t have to marry Caramelinda!”</p><p>Calroy makes a noise like a champion’s bell and clinks his cup against Amethar’s. “Then you don’t have to marry Caramelinda.”</p><p>Amethar is smiling so widely that he spills more than he swallows when he tries to knock his drink back. “You’re the best, Cal, really.”</p><p>Calroy grins back, but when he says “And don’t you forget it,” his voice comes out a touch too demanding.</p><p>Whatever.</p><p>It’s not like Amethar will notice anyway.</p>
<hr/><p>3.</p><p>Amethar is looking for something. Calroy doesn't know what it is; normally he'd dismiss the idea of <em>Amethar</em> keeping a secret from <em>him</em> as too ridiculous to entertain, but Amethar's been spending too much time personally visiting the Dairy Islands to not have a vested interest in what he could find there.</p><p>While Calroy appreciates the space he’s been given to pull at the strings that move Candia, the absence of the King has had the side effect of making the other nobles bolder with their power grabs, more openly distasteful about <em>Calroy's</em> power. If Calroy has to hear another forgettable baron say Amethar's reliance on Calroy is unbecoming and that the king should get <em>more appropriate company</em>, he's going to do something he regrets, like run them through with his sword.</p><p>None of these people know that it's <em>Calroy</em> that keeps their precious liquor and food flowing, that he writes the trade proposals and organizes the council meetings. None of these people have ever had damp soil from a newly weeded field caked so deep under their fingernails that it takes fives washes for the water to run clear, they've never had so much blood dried into the creases of their hands that their palms were dyed red. Everything Calroy has, everything he is, has been fought for, and he refuses to let some snobby nobles or a flighty king ruin this for him.</p><p>He starts by increasing the number of meetings Amethar has to attend. As the Royal Aide-De-Camp, Calroy has almost complete control of Amethar’s schedule and, while it’s typically more advantageous for Calroy to go to these meetings alone and gently shift the popular opinion, Amethar’s stubborn blunt force works just as well when aimed correctly.</p><p>For a while, that is.</p><p>He watches Amethar start to get jittery when he has less and less opportunity to sneak himself off to another country; the man all but <em>whines</em> about having to actually do his duty, and Calroy makes himself grit his teeth in an approximation of a smile and then lets himself grip just a bit too tightly onto Amethar’s arm as he leads him to the next meeting.</p><p>He likes to think that he responds with more restraint than Amethar deserves.</p><p>It’s not until Amethar actually <em>skips a meeting</em>, like he’s a child sneaking out of his lessons, and doesn’t come back to the Castle for a week that Calroy decides this has to come to a stop. He stands outside Amethar’s rooms and puts all his energy into channeling the visage of a kind and concerned best friend. He takes a deep breath to center himself, puts a hand on the doorknob, and enters without announcing himself.</p><p>“Hey, you can’t- Oh, it’s just you,” Amethar says from where he’s making a pathetic attempt to cover the blown-up map of the Dairy Islands, brush still dripping with ink from where he’s been apparently marking the map. He relaxes when he sees Cal, even as Cal tenses.</p><p>This doesn’t look like a silly flight of fancy for Calroy to gently prod Amethar out of pursuing, it doesn’t look like the thrill-seeking work of a boy who misses the adventure of War. This looks calculated, particular. <em>This</em>, Calroy thinks, <em>looks like a nightmare.</em></p><p>“What’s all this, then?” Calroy asks, gesturing.</p><p>Amethar runs a hand over his locs and laughs nervously. “It’s nothing. Just a little project of mine.”</p><p>Calroy wants to sigh, to yell, to demand that Amethar explain, but he knows that Amethar moves easiest when he thinks he's not being moved at all. He furrows his eyebrows, hunches his posture; makes himself look confused and small, hurt and sad, like someone who needs Amethar’s protection. It takes only twenty seconds under Calroy’s pitiful stare before Amethar folds.</p><p>“Okay, fine, but you have to promise to not get mad.”</p><p>“When have I ever been mad at you?” Calroy asks, question rhetorical not because he’s never been angry at Amethar but because Amethar would’ve never realized he had been. “I’m just worried. All this galavanting around, avoiding your duties, it’s not like you.”</p><p>It <em>is</em> like him, Calroy and Amethar both know it, and Amethar slumps at the indictment. Calroy can almost see the cracks appear in his defenses. “Alright. You can’t tell <em>anyone</em>, but I… I have a wife.”</p><p>“You have a what.” Calroy says. It’s not a question, but it should be because <em>surely</em> Calroy’s misheard. Surely <em>Amethar Rocks</em> is not telling Calroy that he has some secret girl in the Islands.</p><p>“A wife. Her name is Catherine Ghee. I was going to marry her the right way after the War, bring her in as my queen, but then I got moved from the Islands and she stopped answering my letters, and then my sisters-” Amethar cuts himself off, clearing his throat thickly. “Anyway, I forgot about it in the shuffle of everything else. And then there was the whole Caramelinda <em>thing</em>, you know.”</p><p>“I know,” Calroy confirms. Bribing enough the duke to make him rescind his acceptance of Lazuli’s -- Amethar’s -- marriage proposal had been his job, after all.</p><p>“Yeah! It reminded me, so I decided to go find her. It’s the right thing to do and, I mean, I think I really loved her, Cal. I think she might’ve been it for me.”</p><p>Calroy’s jaw works hard enough that he feels the joint pop. Calroy closes his eyes in the face of Amethar’s enthusiasm to give himself a second to process. <em>This would’ve been useful to know when you were almost married off to someone else</em>, Calroy thinks but doesn’t say. <em>What do you mean you got married and then just </em>forgot<em> about her? What part of that screams ‘she’s the love of my life’ to you?</em> Calroy thinks but doesn’t ask.</p><p>“Have you had any luck?” Calroy asks when he trusts himself to speak without screaming. Amethar’s face drops immediately.</p><p>“No. I found a few of her friends in her village but they say they haven’t seen her in years, so I’ve just been traveling around. I hope- well. You know what I hope.”</p><p>Calroy hums. He does.</p><p>Many, many Dairy Islanders were lost in the War, a larger percentage than any other country. It’s very possible that Amethar’s Catherine Ghee is dead by now. Still, if she’s <em>not</em>…</p><p>“You should’ve asked me for help in the first place,” Calroy chides, playfully hitting Amethar’s chest. He lets his hand linger, feeling Amethar’s warmth and the strong pulse of his heartbeat through his doublet. “You have <em>people</em> to do things like this. I mean, really Amethar, I completely understand and, usually, I’d be all for this -- hell, I’d <em>join </em>you! -- but when you’re gone so often, it worries the Kingdom.”</p><p>“It does?”</p><p>Calroy hums mournfully, tucking his hands behind his back and turning away from Amethar to study the map. “The War is over and the Concord is formed, but things are still getting back to normal. If your citizens notice their King, the venerated Amethar the Unfallen, leaving them so regularly, what will they think?”</p><p>Calroy doesn’t have to look at how Amethar’s face spasms at the title, but he watches out of the corner of his eye anyway. He knows the flinch intimately, has watched it and caused it enough that it’s burned into his memory; the way it starts with Amethar’s eyes slipping shut, how his jawline shakes, how he twitches as though he’s been slapped. Sometimes, Calroy wishes he could chant it just to see the reaction over and over again. <em>Amethar the Unfallen, Amethar the Last of House Rocks, Amethar the Unprepared</em>.</p><p>“Will people really get upset?” Amethar asks. His voice sounds smaller, less sure. Calroy makes sure his smile is more concern than smug delight before he turns around.</p><p>“It’s very possible,” Calroy answers, “But there’s no need to worry about it. Now that I know what’s going on, I can get the people whose job this <em>should</em> be on it. We’ll find your girl, Amethar.”</p><p>Amethar brightens, falling into step with Calroy and allowing himself to be guided from his rooms. “What would I do without you, Cal?”</p><p>Calroy is already mentally scripting how he'll tell Amethar that <em>I've gotten some news back from the Islands and, well... your wife…</em><em> I'm so sorry, Amethar, the War has taken so much from us all,</em> regardless of what his search-and-destroy party finds. He bumps his shoulder against Amethar's, supportive and affectionate. “Let's hope you never have to find out.”</p>
<hr/><p>4.</p><p>It has been a <em>very</em> long night.</p><p>The day began with a furious letter from the Duke of Meringue, accusing Amethar of defiling and kidnapping his daughter, of breaking his word, of trying to undermine him. Calroy, who reads all of Amethar’s mail, threw the letter into the fire before taking the Amethar his daily stack of relevant but not too important mail. The chaos started only once evening fell, when an unannounced carriage pulled up to the gates, holding none other than the Lady Caramelinda Meringue. Before anyone could react, Caramelinda shoved a letter at Amethar’s chest, furious and red-eyed from crying.</p><p>“I’m pregnant,” She said, with a voice that carried across the courtyards of Castle Candy like a song even as she bowed low and proper, “It is your sister’s. I have come to ask to be quartered by House Rocks, on behalf of my unborn child, your kin.”</p><p>Amethar, the idiot, embraced her and gleefully accepted her words without a lick of proof, while everyone else in the vicinity gossiped and Calroy picked up the letter. It was from Lazuli, of course, and it explained what had happened in the most confusing and circuitous way possible, <em>of course</em>. <em>all will make sense in time</em>, Lazuli said, <em>trust your feelings</em>, Lazuli said, <em>all is as i foresaw, probably, and if it's not then it's close enough that it does not matter</em>, Lazuli said. It all fit perfectly and arrived <em>just</em> in time. Calroy could barely stop himself crushing the letter as he thought of how <em>fortuitous</em> it all was. After all, if he remembered Lazuli, there was probably a note in lemon ink waiting just for him on the back, just like there had been on so many of the missives she sent to Amethar and Rococoa on the front lines.</p><p>Calroy, now, sitting on a part of the castle wall far from the celebration cobbled together for Amethar’s newly accepted sister-in-law and incoming nibling, lets his eyes slide closed for a moment. If there's one Rocks sister he <em>hated</em>, it was Lazuli, who used her foresight for <em>busybodying</em> and <em>mocking</em> instead of something as simple as saving her own life. There's nothing Calroy hates more than a waste of potential.</p><p>He holds the letter carefully over his lamp, watching as the heat darkens the lemon ink until he can clearly read Lazuli’s secret message.</p><p><em>congratulations. or maybe not congratulations, if it didn’t happen in this time</em>, The letter reads,<em> you might never get this letter, or you might get it too late, or it might not matter to you, or you might get it and assume it means something else. it is of no concern to me. congratulations, if they apply.</em></p><p>Calroy presses a hand to his temple, frustrated. This, right here, is why he liked Lazuli the least. He's meditating on that when he hears the footsteps and jolts, his hand is almost around his secret dagger before he recognizes the gait, the sound of the slight drag of expensive shoes and the sure thud of his steps. Calroy forces himself to relax as Amethar swings himself onto the wall beside Calroy, close enough that he can feel the other's warmth.</p><p>“What a day. Just like Laz to drop something like that in a <em>letter</em>,” He starts without prompting, “When I was a kid and snuck out, she was almost always waiting right outside the gate for me like she’d used her divination just to scare me shitless. She loved that kind of stuff. Guess she wanted one last <em>gotcha</em>, huh?”</p><p>Amethar swings his legs restlessly as he gazes out over his Kingdom, lost expression making him look more like the youth of his story than the Ruler of the Sugarlands. Calroy reaches over and pats Amethar’s knee. “It’s not your fault.”</p><p>He says it both because Amethar wants to hear it and because it’s true; with all the forces invested in the downfall of the less impressionable Rocks siblings, it would’ve been impossible for Amethar to stop it.</p><p>Amethar’s eyes clear as he nods, and then he reaches down and takes Calroy’s hand in his own. “You always know exactly what to say.”</p><p>“You make it easy,” Calroy says, half a joke. Amethar snorts, and then he pulls their joined hands up and presses a candyfloss-soft kiss to Calroy’s knuckles</p><p>It happens so quickly that Calroy can’t anticipate it or stay his reactions; the shock that he feels, the flush rising to his cheeks and the speeding of his heart, is all entirely real. Amethar looks up at Calroy through his lashes and smiles at whatever expression he finds, slow and small. When he lowers his lips back down to Calroy’s hand, this time a proper kiss right at the curve of his wrist, Calroy is more ready.</p><p>He goes for flattered but nervous, allowing some of his real tension to make a laugh come out jerky and unsure. He widens his eyes and looks away even as he continues to let Amethar hold his hand. “Your Majesty-”</p><p>“Please,” Amethar murmurs, and when Calroy turns his head he’s looking back at Calroy with warm, expectant eyes, “Not from you, Cal. Never from you.”</p><p>“Amethar,” Calroy concedes, and is rewarded with a brilliant grin, “I don’t- I didn’t think-”</p><p>“I didn’t think of it either,” Amethar says, picking up Calroy’s purposefully fumbled sentence with perfect timing. “But it just makes <em>sense</em>. We’ve been through so much together and I wouldn’t be able to run anything around here without you; you’re my partner in all but ceremony at this point anyway. And Laz’s letter said to trust my heart.”</p><p>“And your heart says-”</p><p>“Yes. Yes, this is what my heart wants, Cal. What about you? Will you give me, give <em>this</em>, a chance?”</p><p>Calroy gives himself exactly two seconds. Any longer and Amethar will get anxious, any shorter and Calroy will seem desperate. In those two seconds, Calroy starts to reorganize his gameplan for the next five years and makes a mental note to write a letter to Ceresia to personally inform them of this development. He takes a deep breath in, lets it out, and smiles like the crescent moon above them.</p><p>“I'm so lucky,” Calroy says, entangling their fingers, “To have had a man like you beside me all this time. I would be luckier to keep him at my side.”</p><p>“Not as lucky as I’ll be,” Amethar says, looking like he’s barely holding himself back from doing something decidedly improper. He settles for pressing another kiss to Calroy’s hand and Calroy, sitting atop the parapet of a castle that may very well be his much sooner than planned, looks out to the sparkling stars. <em>Not as lucky as you indeed</em>, he thinks, but still, when he squeezes Amethar’s hand, their hearts beat as one.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>thanks for reading! if you liked it, kudos, comments, and bookmarks fill the part of my soul that was scooped out by cal's betrayal</p><p>if you're Super into this for some reason then you can always <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/11KsA_N_8ybwFRryH-bqE9tULBhEoivFxNk6cu50yX_Q/edit?usp=sharing">read the prince consort calroy doc</a> if you want but its literally 11k of d20soc spiraling. we are all cursed with calrot</p><p><a href="http://www.pldubrahs.tumblr.com">Main Tumblr (pldubrahs)</a> | <a href="http://nacreousglowclouds.tumblr.com/">Writing Tumblr (nacreousglowclouds)</a> | <a href="http://twitter.com/squidias">Twitter (@squidias)</a></p></blockquote></div></div>
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